Under new direction by the brothers Ahmed, a Sedgefield restaurant has been transformed into Spice Ministers

ONE of the least preposterous theories assiduously entertained by the lady of this house is that whenever two or three are gathered together, there also shall there be someone who's played football - usually in goal - for Shildon.

It's extraordinary how often it happens.

It only starts getting silly when she supposes most of them only to have one leg.

Possessed of two of everything necessary for that most demanding of disciplines, Lee Walker had kept goal for Shildon, though the time-honoured ten bob in the boots probably didn't explain his spanking new Maserati parked outside Spice Ministers restaurant.

"It was going to be an Aston Martin DB, but it won't be ready until February," he said. Either way, you don't get many of them to the gallon in Coxhoe, from where he runs a nursing agency.

Spice Ministers is in Sedgefield, formerly Blairtown, open almost three months. In a previous incarnation it was simply Ministers, unashamedly touching a forelock to the local MP and the venue for little Leo's head wetting. It's possible that Cherie called it something more upmarket.

Now it's owned by the Ahmed brothers - no one seemed quite sure how many there were; a canny few, anyway - who also have restaurants in East Boldon, near Sunderland, and on the Quayside in Newcastle.

The signed photograph of the former PM has been stored away somewhere - "We have it safe," said Monwar Ahmed, who engagingly fronts house - though the House of Commons whisky remains, unopened, behind the bar.

It was a Tuesday evening in January, the place still reasonably busy. Lee had driven down the A177 for the family supper, as he does two or three times a week, recalled as he waited in the extremely attractive reception area the joint joys of being Shildon's goalie and of the new restaurant.

"An absolutely fabulous place," he said and so it pretty much proved. "Classy,"

said The Boss, utterly enthusiastically.

Lee also insisted upon paying for the early beers, the best save he's made for years. The only snag was that we talked football for so long - The Boss waiting with commendable, if somewhat resigned, forbearance - that she had to order for us both in order to get a word in at all.

For me she had chosen mulligatawny soup - very nicely spiced, manifestly home made, just £2.50 - and a dish of duck breast cooked with tamarind and honey in what was described as a mild sauce.

The bird was very tasty, the sauce so mild it could have auditioned for a Fairy Liquid advert, but that was hardly the fault of the restaurant.

We'd begun with the customary tray of pickles which The Boss considered not just the best but "unequivocally" the best that ever she had eaten in an Asian restaurant.

She followed with an exceptionally attractively presented starter of baked green pepper stuffed with lightly spiced prawns - "wonderful," she thought - following with "deshi mech biran", described as lightly spiced fish, pan fried, served with sweet and sour sauce, pilau rice and a mixed vegetable bhaji.

That rarity in an Indian restaurant, it was a whole fish, apparently found in Bangladeshi fresh water. Once again, full marks for presentation.

Dilwar, the Ahmed in the kitchen, used to be a mortgage adviser. He was the clever one of the family, said Monwar.

"For a mortgage adviser," said The Boss, "he makes a damn good chef."

The menu includes other hitherto unencountered dishes like dil pasand, a name which could almost have come from the scorecard of the third test but which was defined as "a delectable lamb dish with a slightly creamy texture and wonderful nutty flavour derived from roasted and ground poppy seeds".

Like the wholly relaxing reception area, the dining room seemed essentially English. Lee had supposed it to be more like Calcutta: possibly more Calcutta than Coxhoe, anyway.

The music machine features what probably are called crooners, English and American. The Boss thought the fellers sounded like the little Lofty chap on It Aint Half Hot Mum, though it was more like those Embassy records that poor families like us used to buy for 4/9d from Woolworth's because we couldn't afford the originals.

The service was polished, the tablecloths changed after every meal, the atmosphere gently convivial. With a couple of side dishes - her and her grand old okra - and a couple of drinks ordered after Lee had sped off, the total reached just £38.

Great value.

After all that speculation, all those months of soul searching, old Tony may have got out at just the wrong time.

■ Spice Ministers, Church View, Sedgefield, Co Durham, 01740-622201.

Open seven nights from 5.30pm, no problem for the disabled. Bookings strongly recommended at weekends.

Twenty per cent off for takeaways, even those travelling by Maserati.

SINCE we've been talking Ember Inns of late, it should be recorded that the 182nd of that brand - but just the second new build - opened in Mulberry Rise, Hartlepool, last week. At an auction for the Kay Smith Research Fund, a local breast cancer charity, David Atkinson paid £800 for the privilege of pulling the Tall Ships' first pint. He probably didn't spill a drop.

IN the company of former Durham polliss Bobby Hull - stationed at Esh Winning, your Worships - we took lunch at Bondgate Methodist Church, one of Darlington's little gems. The place overflowed, necessitating a little social table sharing. If there'd been that many on a Sunday morning, they'd have been delighted.

"I'm Keith from Reeth," said the retired Methodist minister opposite.

The menu offers all-day snacks and light meals, plus wholly inexpensive and pretty traditional lunchtime dishes - cottage pie, perhaps, or a curry or a very tasty and nicely presented sweet and sour chicken (£3.60).

Bobby had a large bowl of beef broth, piping hot when it arrived, rather cooler when he allowed it a word in edgeways.

There are some legless cuddies around Esh Winning.

Two puddings, apricot crumble and treacle sponge, were just £1.60 and close to ambrosial. With a couple of Cokes, the bill for two was less than £10.

The service was swift, the welcome genuinely warm. For many, however, the best news of all about eating at Bondgate Methodists may be that nothing is shoved down your throat except a thoroughly good lunch. After that we went for a pint.

CHAP in the Cons Club in Richmond last week was going on about fried panga - presumably not as in pangas and mash - being on offer at the Mermaid fish bar in Willington.

According to the dictionary, a panga's an African knife. More reports welcomed; he stuck to his cod, anyway.

IT'S widely known that we food critics eat in all the best places, which may not entirely explain why last Tuesday afternoon we ended up at the canteen trailer on the industrial estate behind Billingham railway station.

A van offering global logistics was parked nearby. Today Billingham, tomorrow the world.

It may not be said that the burger was the best ever, and the coffee wouldn't even qualify for that faint praise, but the two lasses running the place were splendid.

In the three or four minutes it took to cook lunch, we learned that Lisa wasn't crying because she was upset but because she'd been chopping onions, that it had been a happy Christmas, that things weren't what they used to be and that the blonde lady was in the habit of walking her dog in her pyjamas.

"Mind," she said prudently, "I wear a coat over the top."

There'll be any amount of swankier places, but few more inexpensive or more chatty. It was just £2.10, the lot. If they can find someone to tow, we wish them God speed.

and finally, the bairns wondered if we knew how to start a pudding race.

Say go, of course.